Putting off hard choices, againRepublicans and Democrats fight about a lot of things, but one thing they agree about: When in doubt, put off the hard choices. If the $17 trillion national debt wasn’t proof enough of this, then more evidence came in the form of the budget deal worked out between Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., and other negotiators this week. Congress was expected to vote on it between the time I write this and the time you are reading it...

Election time for journalists as ’13 ends LITTLE ROCK — It’s election season in Arkansas again — but this time for its journalists. In an annual ritual, the people who leave a newspaper at your doorstep, broadcast news to your living room or drop it onto your tablet will gaze at their navels over the next few days and select the 10 state stories that stood out during 2013. It’s not an easy thing to do. Bad weather often, but not always, rises to the top of the pile. Since virtually ev...

Raising taxes on pastorsMany pastors across the country are paying attention to a federal court case in Wisconsin that could have a big impact on their taxes. Last month, U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb ruled that the federal tax law which allows a “minister of the gospel” to receive part of his or her income designated for housing expenses tax-free is unconstitutional. The law has been around for almost as long as the federal income tax. In 1921, Congress passed a...

Santa’s fighter jet escorts raise speculationIt appears the North American Aerospace Defense Command, NORAD, has ruffled a few feathers. Since the 1950s, NORAD has tracked Santa during his Christmas Eve journey. According to various media outlets, in addition to providing the animated tracking information, NORAD announced Santa’s sleigh will be escorted through the skies by two fighter jets. Now, I can see how some folks might be upset by the announcement. Considering the current deficit...

Letter to the editor (Dec. 11, 2013)Study the legacy of Obama Sometimes a person with a great sense of fairness and a superior intellect gains the presidential office of a nation. And when that person is obsessed with the idea that he knows better than do the people not only what they need but also what they want, what a legacy he can carve out for himself. In the case of our president, his knowledge is so profound that it exceeds that of the founding fathers. He knows better th...

New database shows rapid growth of football coaches’ salariesWhen Gus Malzahn bolted from Arkansas State University, which had given him his first head coaching job, about this time last year, he nearly tripled his $850,000 salary, generous by the standards of most Arkansans who work for a living. One could hardly blame him, though; Auburn University offered a 5-year deal worth about $2.3 million annually. That move made a lot of ASU football fans angry. But college football has become a big business, e...

Senate candidates hold back attacksLITTLE ROCK — The bare-knuckle brawl that had been the Arkansas U.S. Senate race has entered its softer season, with both candidates toning down the rhetoric amid the holidays. In the past two weeks, we’ve learned that Tom Cotton’s mama loves her boy and that Mark Pryor loves Jesus. Cotton loves Jesus, too, but his current ad campaign doesn’t come out and say so directly. Cotton, a Republican congressman from Dardanelle, decided last summer to...

Consumer finance needs better moralsDrawing moral lines in our rough-and-tumble capitalist system can be hard. But it should not tax too many ethical muscles to set aside some protections for trusting, unsophisticated borrowers of modest means. That is, unless you’re a politician working on behalf of predatory lenders. And it’s amazing how many politicians do, making the recent successes of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau seem all the more miraculous. The CFPB was creat...

Give a book for ChristmasAs Christmas approaches, the shopping mall can become a shopping maul. One of the ways of buying gifts for family and friends, without becoming part of a mob scene in the stores, is to shop on the Internet. However, for many kinds of gifts, you want to be able to see it directly, and perhaps handle it, before you part with your hard-earned cash for it. One gift for which that is unnecessary is a book. Books are ideal Christmas presents from th...

Winter weather need not isolateLITTLE ROCK —- Once again, we have seen the wild weather swings in Arkansas that often mark the late weeks of fall. With our state getting its first full taste of winter last week, I want to recap how inclement conditions are handled in state government. We always strive for a careful balance between preserving the services your tax dollars pay for while also protecting the safety and well-being of our state employees. When my office announced...

Leaves still have some use after fallEvery time my four-year old sons pass a pile of leaves they look up at me excitedly with a lilt in their voice. “Mom, it’s still fall!” they exclaim with wonder as they jump or kick their way through the crunch and squish of the pile. Kids seem to understand the magic of fallen leaves. Adults tend to see leaves as something to gather into a trash pile. But children have a way of reminding adults of the things we’ve grown to overlook. A few day...

by
Meredith Martin-MoatsThe Courier Your Messenger For The River Valley

Stadium debate: times, tradition, change University of Arkansas Athletic Director Jeff Long’s announcement last week that the Razorbacks will play only one game at Little Rock’s War Memorial Stadium for the next five years – with no guarantee of any games after that – was a big deal. It was a big deal because the Razorbacks have been playing games there since the stadium opened in 1948. With a capacity of 54,120 and assuming the vast majority of attendees are from this state, when th...

Fleeing TV for good reasonMarketing surveys now show that when Americans come home from work, more folks turn on their computers than their television sets. That is a first. The reason is twofold: First, you can create your own world on your PC, and second, TV is awful. Flat-out awful. For years, television has been losing viewers because the product, generally speaking, has collapsed. Reality TV has destroyed the tube. Cheap, mindless shows featuring people who should...

State to get less tax funds this yearLITTLE ROCK — Budget officials revised their economic forecast for the current fiscal year, and now predict that state government will collect 1.7 percent less in tax revenue than it did last year. The state will still generate sufficient revenue so that all state agencies can meet their budgets. It does reduce the amount of anticipated surplus that is predicted to be available at the end of the fiscal year, which is June 30, 2014. For the fir...

by
State Capitol Week in Review The Courier Your Messenger For The River Valley

Volunteer in your communityThe holidays are often a time when many families have a greater sense of helping those in need. But in Arkansas, we can boast that our citizens donate an enormous amount of their time year round. So much so that our state budget would be greatly impacted if it wasn’t for the generosity of our citizens. According to the 2012 Economic Impact of Arkansas Volunteers Report, an astounding 595 thousand Arkansans donated their time in some capacity. ...

by
Arkansas House of RepresentativesThe Courier Your Messenger For The River Valley

Fatherly advice times a millionWhen I was around 17, my father gave me a piece of advice. I didn’t know it at the time — sitting there waiting for the traffic signal to change at the intersection of the Martha Mitchell Expressway and Blake Street in Pine Bluff — but the brief admonishment would have profound consequences for my life. As Thanksgiving is the one day each year we’re almost legally obliged to ponder that for which we are thankful, this seems as good a time as a...

Power of the unseen governmentCan you remember your first real job and how much you were paid for doing it? Well, I can, almost as though it was yesterday. It was chopping cotton for 10 hours a day in a little community called Olyphant, Jackson County, which is just north of Possum Grape, where my folks lived at the time. The going rate was $4 per day. I lasted four days. When I got paid and had those 16 brand new one dollar bills I thought I was rich, which sounds better ...

The tradition of Little Rock Hogs gamesGrowing up in Arkansas, it was a given that I would be a Razorback fan. Although my parents are from Georgia, they moved to Fayetteville to work at the University of Arkansas for Campus Crusade for Christ after they graduated from college. By the time I was born they had transferred to Arkansas State University in Jonesboro, but calling the Hogs was already a family tradition. The love for the Hogs went from the abstract to the concrete when m...

Removing some of the waste from collegeThe Arkansas Razorbacks lost to both Mississippi schools this year in football, but at least the state leads in another, more important area: the number of adults age 25-64 with college degrees. The bad news is that there are 47 states to go. At 21 percent, Arkansas ranks ahead of only Mississippi and West Virginia, according to the Census Bureau’s 2012 American Community Survey. Washington, D.C., whose football team also has had a disappointi...

Prospects grow dimmer for 2013 farm billOne of the casualties of the do-little 113th Congress will be the 2013 farm bill, which is two years overdue. Without action, parts of the law will revert to the original 1938 and 1949 versions, resulting in milk prices as high as $7 a gallon. A conference committee has been trying to work out a compromise between a Senate farm bill and what the House passed in two bills. Reports indicate the committee is getting nowhere, though certainly not ...